Xiubo Li

The APT Jeju 2026 Main Event is underway, and after 10 levels of play in Flight A, 96 players have bagged chips for Day 2 at LES A Casino inside Jeju Shinhwa World.

The KRW 2,700,000 (~USD 1,850) buy-in Main Event features a hefty KRW 2.2 billion (~USD 1.5 million) guarantee, and Flight A drew 297 entries (217 unique) as players got their first shot with their 40,000-chip starting stack. Levels ran for 60 minutes each, and play wrapped up at the end of Level 10, around 11:00 PM.

Combined with the 223 OnLive Day 1 entries who competed on tour sponsor Natural8, that brings the total number of Main Event entries up to 520, with 31 players having fought their way through to Day 3 and the paying positions via Natural8.

Leading the live pack is China's Xiubo Li, who bagged 381,000 to finish comfortably clear of the field. Russia's Dmitrii Belikov sits second with 306,100, while Hong Kong's Timothy Chung rounds out the top three with 300,900 after an impressive comeback from 33,500 earlier in the day.

Dmitrii Belikov

Top Ten Counts

For the full list of Flight A survivors, click here.

The Day's Action

Li did most of his building in the later parts of the day. In one of his biggest recorded pots of the session, he jammed his covering stack on the river of a five-way pot to force a fold from Dahai Shen, before gratuitously showing what appeared to be the nuts. From there he kept on building, eventually finishing ahead of the pack.

Timothy Chung

Chung's route to the top three was a little trickier. He was on the wrong end of a big pot against Rene von Reden in the early levels, folding to a river shove on a paired board and dropping to 33,500. He rebuilt steadily through the afternoon and went on a late run at the expense of Jason Chau to finish just shy of Belikov. Von Reden himself climbed past 100,000 but was unable to bag during today's session.

Fendy Kosasih had a rollercoaster session

Fendy Kosasih had a rollercoaster of a day of his own. The Indonesian lost a big pot to Sam Ameen after folding to a 23,000 river bet, then dropped to 6,500 after two more setbacks. With his tournament life on the line, he check-shoved with flopped trips against Xinze Li's two pair to get back on steadier footing, before ultimately bagging just over 95,000 at the end of the night.

There was a memorable moment at Zhongyan Sui's table, who was five-bet jammed by Cao Tran Ngoc. Yue Sun folded ace-queen face up, only for Sui to call and table the exact same hand. Sui held against Ngoc's queen-ten to eliminate him, and Sun was left watching a pot she would have split.

Anthony Kastelic

Elsewhere, Anthony Kastelic flopped a set of deuces and got paid by Jingjing Li's top two pair across three streets, while Luo Zhang turned a set of nines against Matthias Smit's ace-king to double up. Later on, Jianping Cai sent Long Nguyen Thanh to the rail with ace-king against king-ten, and he finished the night with around 211,000.

Notables Making It Through

Lee Wee Liew wasted no time getting back to work after winning Saturday's Korea National Cup for KRW 70,334,000 (~USD 51,900). The Malaysian registered late and bagged 128,200. National Cup fifth-place finisher Zu You Wang also made it through, although with a shorter stack of 48,200.

Ren Lin

Ren Lin needed multiple bullets to get there, but the winner of both the Super High Roller and Superstar Challenge at APT Jeju Classic earlier this year will return on Day 2 with 125,400, assuming he doesn't bag better in the later flights.

Sam Ameen (114,500), Anthony Kastelic (103,500), Martin Sedlak (99,000) and Jun Li (98,600) all return with healthy stacks, as does Trung Quan Nguyen, who re-entered and bagged 117,400.

APT Taipei Main Event Winner Walter Lau failed to bag in Flight A

Not everyone was as fortunate. Chun Shing "Walter" Lau, David "Dave Spade" Erqiaga, Abraham Ceesvin, Nevan Chang, Lester Edoc and Rene von Reden were among those who failed to bag, although they will have plenty more chances in the remaining starting flights.

The Main Event continues with Flight B, which kicks off at 11:00 a.m. local time on September 28.

Unlike Flight A, where levels lasted 60 minutes throughout, Flight B will play its first six levels at 45 minutes each before switching to 60-minute levels from Level 7 onwards.

Play has now concluded in Flight A of the Main Event, with the surviving 96 players bagging up and taking their stacks through to Wednesday's Day 2.

Stay tuned for a recap of the day's action.

The floor has announced that the Main Event Flight A field will play five more hands before the survivors bag up for the evening.

Long Nguyen Thanh

Button Long Nguyen Thanh got his remaining stack of around 50,000 in against cutoff Jianping Cai, and the two showed down with Thanh awaiting his fate:

Long Nguyen Thanh: K T

Jianping Cai: A K

Thanh's hopes of a double were all but gone when the A 9 4 flop was fanned, although the J turn did offer a little in the form of a gutshot.

It wasn't to be, however, as the 2 river bricked and the Vietnamese player was eliminated.

Tony Lin

With action folding to the blinds, small blind Tony Lin shoved all-in for 17,200 without apparently looking at his cards. Anthony Kastelic in the big blind called, putting Lin at risk and taking them to showdown.

Tony Lin: 8 4

Anthony Kastelic: A 6

Teh flop came 3 9 A pushing Kastelic lead further. The runout K 5 didn't help Lin at all.

Lin left the table ready to re-enter the tournament.

Hon Cheong Lee

Small blind Xing Wang limped and big blind Hon Cheong Lee checked his option.

Wang fired 1,400 on the 6 6 A flop and Lee stuck in the call.

Both checked the 3 turn to the 5 river, where Wang checked. Lee placed 3,500 into the middle and Wang didn't take too long to call, only to muck as Lee turned over Q 5 for third pair.

Xing Wang

Changcai Pan

It seemed like a friendly heads-up hand with 9,000 already in the pot. The dealer spread 9 2 2 Meng Wu checked from the big blind and Changcai Pan checked after.

Action went check, check once again on the A turn. But action resumed with Wu firing 1,500 into the pot on the A river.

Pan was deep in thought then made a pot-sized bet. Wu, visibly perplexed, tried to figure what Pan could have after all the checking. After burning through a time card, he finally made the call by throwing one chip in.

Pan tabled K 5 for a flush. Wu looked at his hand, flicked it, smiled then threw it in the muck.

Ren Lin

Flight A players have just under an hour left to build a stack for Wednesday's Day 2 of the Main Event, and a number of notables have sat down during the final level of the day.

Among them are last night's Korea National Cup champion Lee Wee Liew and Ren Lin, who took down both the Super High Roller and the Superstar Challenge at APT Jeju Classic earlier this year.

Jason Chau

Jason Chau in cutoff and Timothy Chung had already built a pot of 6,000 while they waited for the flop.

The dealer fanned out 9 K T . Chau fired 2,5000 which Chung called.

On the 7 turn, Chau continued the pressure with 5,000 but Chung went beyond and made it 19,000. Chau looked at Chung in an attempt to read his mind. After a few seconds, he made the call to see the last card.

The rier fell 4 . Chau checked the action to Chung who shot out 34,000 into the pot. That's worth half of Chau's stack behind.

The cutoff player took his time to mull things over, needing to burn a time card in the process. He made a one-chip call just to muck his hand after seeing Chung's K T for a two-pair.

As the dealer pushed the pot to Chung, Chau kept shaking his head and unable to contain himself said, "You have all the chps and still getting everything." Chung tried to defend himself but Chau continued to shake his head in frustration.

Luo Zhang raised to 2,800 from under the gun before facing a three-bet shove of 14,100 from cutoff Bo Dou. Zhang didn't take too much time before putting in the call and the two players tabled their cards:

Bo Dou: J T

Luo Zhang: A 3

Both got a piece of the 9 Q 5 action flop, with Dou still behind on an open-ender, and Zhang ahead with ace-high and the nut flush draw.

The 8 turn completed Dou's straight, leaving him needing to avoid a diamond to stay in the game. The J river bricked for both players and Dou scored the full double through Zhang.